.Jol~nal or’Pragmatics 4 (1980) 537-542 Q North-Holland Publkhing Company

CAN WOMEN’S LANGUAGE CAUSE CHANGES? COMMENTS ON THE TROUBLE WITH LINGUISTPCS *

CLSELA KLANN-DELIUS

Once again linguistic experts rather obviously not only talk about quadruples. quintuples, ordered pairs, about interaction in gene ral and the linguistic means by which it :is guaranteed in specific, but they unceremoniously use an everyday vzrd in the language of science : change.

This is what Senta Tr;jmel-Plotz does, when she states: “Women’s language means change” (Tr8melPliitz 1979aj [ 11. Such an invasion of ordinariness has both a scanddous ‘and alluring effect: do there possibly stili (or again) exist secret con- nection liines between the individual, the social and the academic life? Connectio:ls that do not only originate from the need of the person affected, but from the mat- ter itself?

Simphy reading the sentence “Womtn’s language means change” in an academic treatise arouses expectant curiosity as well as the voice of the sceptic in ourselves who warns us to finally make sense of previous disappointing, experiences.

This is how he begins: “Now how exactly were things in the heydays of the *worker’s, language’, of ‘sociolinguistics’? Just try 10 remember. Yes. 4 bourse, those were good and lively times, when in the beginning linguisti,;s was still a foreign word everywhere, even at the utiverSitieS (at least in Western Germany). In those days you could write your Chomsky-type grammars and think yolc! were making an important contribution to ,>he revolutionary progress of society. You could re&ly believe then that these grammars Could undeniabiy prove the iinglistic force of the working class against the bourgeois defeatists of the $errit;teincamp: Slower of thought, emotional riches, znsuousness, power of speech, truth even, all this was guaranteed in the historical subject’called working class; yak; orlitr had to discover it. It was certainly pleasing for ye rurself too: your academic work had a definite, straightforward direction. St& take a look at the whole story and try not !o glorif? the past - what actually happened? Today, whoever talks about the ‘worker’s Ian-

* I gratefill& acknowledge the help oi Rita Pokorny, London, who took care of the JEnglish manaIaticn.

[I) Similaxly, in Tr6mel-PlMz (197%: 27). See also the :teview of Triimel=Pliitz 1979b by Ruth Wodak in this issue of the Journal.; pp. 543-545.

537

suage’ appears to be an incorrigible relic of the past, forever al mos?-back, a politi.cal ‘an&c. Ip the good old dayrs language use was thought to be linked with social class n a clear way, linguistics was claimed to be closely related to politics. But these oonds tktere quickly severed when things tur:ned out ito be more difficult. So what did you learn from the fact that intention and reality are as alike as the Bobsy Twins? Fearfully you crawled back into your study. Drive.n by a bad conscience over the mere generality vf your thoughts you sought shelter behind respectable academic druagery. Today, your demands defitely belong to yesterday. They have aged in your world of science as much as your face under well-preserved long hair. Even is’ converted to th.8 pragmatic creed, your demands really look as conform as ihe jeans you arc still wear:ing out of a deep-down necessity. So let me tell you this”, t.he scepaic finishes oTf, “‘it b an illusion to hope that science and real life cousld ever directly unite. YOFJ wilx never grow up if you do not abandon th s idea”.

!y does our sceptic react so :;trongly? Why does he indulge in S&T a long s~ecfn’? I: he not that certain after all? Does his reaction not simply confirm that 1% is ~ustiflrc, to wish for a connc::ting link between private life and a~.:adernic wa,rk, fhat to hope for changes &CI in our branch of science is noi rmerely i !lusory , but uti:+n 8’ the least?

“Desr peptic”, we shall answer, “your irterpretation is only one part of the story. We certainly did have illusions, some mOre, others fewer, but there was a rea- grin for them. They could easily survive on reality’s nutritiou;s substances th:rn. The work~r‘s l%nguaga underprivileged natus wasn’t talked about only in acadelnic cir- c&. It was the motto of even the most official government documents., of schcol curricula etc. What is more, we qui&ly realized that the ov~erall aim had tt:i be to Aang~ tl-u* ctiiums%ances, noi: just language itself. Also, many of us understood that -rg.ht &??rc* we had no power at all. The way you describe our efforts to digest this ~~~de~s~and~~ is bad caricamre. W~L t else was there to do but at least try to bccom- ;rEuiu a ~QY~XZ job, to make our demands for ‘:hange stick, at least in our QW’I~ field. A ~“~~~r:~~~~~ ~ra~~~istic theory. cannot be written in one day. Its beginnings havr: P,c be ~~av~id~b~y gne~al and open for other possibilities. I adm.it that out of ~~~~~~~~si~~ we often got stuck in linguistic formalities, but one has to tr jr out mp,c’s tcml~ flrsr behare one knows what they are good for. §o this, Mr. Scep!ic, is fir>!. the crucial point. The decisive factor is that we kept forgetting something truly ~~~g~t~~ ourselves. We spoke a Ia~~~~~~e which made us feel safe, sin :e it rern~~~d alien to us. Some of us perhaps even felt comfortable as the avantgarde rsf the ~~~k~~g class, uecause it remained alien to them. In short: if wc iid not se!& ousiy gef involved in reality, it was because we did not get involved t nough in our- S&JTS. @or wish to knk our persoml so&. bife and our emotions witi*: an academic ar&& and me;if^-.d:-“’ JC- -I 10 tbdi u~~q&ne r&ly remained in the abstract, belause we only ~~~~ it q ~~~~~~~~~~y against bad reality without changing, anything in ourselves.

t of to cd c~rn~~i~~e~~ to others we overlooked questions such as: what kind of ,~~~~d~ and social life ~8 were leading. what kind of academic work we actualIy

and to what extent it was our own fault that CUT prir:itc;: and profes- ~~~~~ iiwe did not I~rmonize.”

C. Klann-Delilre / The trouble with linguistics 539

For you, gentle reader, who h:ld the patience to follow these comments up to ‘this point, the sceptic’s words presumably contained nothing new. Most likely his antipode, calbng on you to be serious about matters of subjectivity, only aroused your suspicion rather than convincing you. ‘& One of those fashionable phrases again, back to introspection - hogwash, nothing but wishful intellectual thinking. Objet- tivity did not quite work out, so now subjectivity is in.” This is the kind of associa- tions you might have.

Gentle reader, your criticism is, of course, harsh. But if you can spare another moment I shall state my point of view.

Let us first 0.F all look at the sentence which was at the bottom of all these mani- fold associations, and place it in its proper context. Afte : all, this is what good lin- guistics is all about.

‘Women’s language means change” was the linguist Se tta Tromel-Plotz’s remark concluding a lecture on the theme “Men talk - women keep silent”. In this, she summarizes the consequences to be. drawn from wornelI’s silence and men’s elo- quence. She tells women to break silence, to talk their own language, to develop their identity and stand up for it. just iike maie repression is also manifested in speech and language, we wclmen must change it through language, the assumption being that “If we speak in 2 different manner, men will do the same in return” (‘Tromel-PlStz 1979,~ 14).

Now, let’s examine what substance there is in the thesis that wom3n’s language means change in the particular field of reality for which it was formulated, i.e. the science of language. Here, the the sfr and its implications mean this: In an academic discourse of mixed sexes, conversation roles are distributed in such a ‘way that con- versational predominance falls to the ma!e academics. When the floor is given to the females, they turn out to speak the language of their male colleagues, which is the only language they h;ave. Women lack a. female identity as well as an academic one. The language of linguistics is ahr academic language, mad: by men. To women scien- tists, this represents severe re3%rictions on their possible cievelopment. They, as well as their male colleagues, have to find another language th,ey can use in their work; they have to free themselves from the stigmata of repression, even thge linguistic ones. As a via Regina TromelPlotz suggests that women speak differently, and hopes that male academics will speak differently to them in return.

So what she suggests is that the persons involved should first of all do something ar,d thus cause changes in themselves. Much of the literature on women’s affairs wears itself out in furious and desperate accusations against the men’s world. As much as t&e outbursts are necessary , q.hey also block the way to an understanding of’ the problem. Experience shows thart embodying one’s complex problems in an outward enemy has thfe emot:ional funcaion of relieving OUSeiWS of having to bear the full resi2onsibility for certain features in the repression of women. l&S this is not enough: women also have to see to it that they change themselves and carry out changes.

Creating a different language is as unavoidable as its consequences are tiresome.

540 G. Klann-Relius / The fmuble with linguistics

Also, it remains to be seen whether women actually will be rewarded for their efforts: Will men actually speak t 3 tl ‘em in a different way? Will women not be left gut despite ail their courage anl viihngness to assume responsibility and make changes? Will they not in disappointment give up this laborious work? Is it possible a~ ah to create a different, more hum.,:ne, and less alienated language? Are coopena- Five, fricmhy forms of interaction in science possible?

Li!t us have a look at the reality al,1 of us know and complain about in personal conversations.

Ttte patte;ns of speech inside academic work are exclusive: in the academic lam- guape of hnguistics, a personal inerest (not to speak of an emotional !invoivement) in the problems - which actually !s a feature of the everyday language of humans - is disapproved of. At most, such things are allowed in personal presentations of urne’s sclentiric results, such as thl: academic lecture, whlere they h#ave degeneratbed isgto thy ritualized form of an entertaining joke or a personal anecdote, meant to dtmoars~rate the profundity of 0~‘:‘s academic commitment. In today’s scientific pub& uncertainty and doubt are not acceptable. The academic presents himself as the spokesman of inteheet 0’: of the data, as embodiment of his theory. He who wan&, and has ~3 be a&now!ed;:ed c!oes not say or wr.ite, “My thesis is”, or “I HNI: to say”, but “The ihesis im z&es”, “The tf eory say!;“, “The data show” ei:~. iIcre it is the t~o~~~ts that speak, the abstract notions or concepts that act, not th.e people who produce them. CEaritJ, is confused with preci:gion, richness and variety ui thought are sacrificed to exact 1 heory. The language of linguistics as an academic &qSine is more than often dry as dust. It lacks color and imagination, and tine ~b~~~~~~ s shrouded they exist) are lashed onto the Procrustean bed of Wittgenstein’s iiiecr;sraE ~tmctures. It is a language without humcr, where: anecdotes are a disgrace uplfcu given dignity by methodical claims (the case of ethnamethodclogy). Direct ref~.~errces IS persona? experience; and observations are easily suspected of being mere ~ed~~~~~c~~ tracks. The set phrases cf this language hardly patch up the pieces anal particles left after the havoc wrought by our anaQse!c:; there is never time ~~T~UII@ to pL-t them t.ogether anyway. This language is enrpfy and Mated and not ssr3& in its written rn~~~s~atio~~ which is the one that counts. Often enough, it rep&es ~~d~~~d~~t~- by individudiism. Th_!s language is cast in a terminolo,gical, cor~cept~al mold of possessive &irking. Ilt the same way as any video-firm throws a ~Gfferena qstem on the market which is not compatible with others, almost every miw: of science estaP?lshes his own company of ideas and terms.

fkre, at Least, scientific language cuite obviously rexveals something language its&f cantnot be bhmed far. Neither earl it, by itself, eliminate the fact. Academics, fog. have to s=& ~ern~~ves on the market. 3%~ demand for the results of their wcrrk is the zG.stentia~ condition for their economic security. Par the individual ~~~~~~ wc~ker, the freedom of science lies in either to submit himself t,o !he &r&s of ~~~~~y d demand on the science market, or to change his job. An acade- mic may ~~~ to use a bole in *he market, succeeds in seiling himself and enjoys the b gs of ~o~~g an sffhe for fife. Prcm then on he is subject only to the

laws of his own “inner market”, his own demands, and of his conscience. The latter will certainly not be stienced after having gt’3wn and expanded during all those years of competition and drudgery. Each encou;lter with fellowexperts \N$ gk;e ground for its further expansion. Productivity and willingness to accept hmovdtions become synonymous with professional circles’ appreciation. Of course, they reward only the academically free individual who plays their game. As he is not free, he will have to pretend to be academically autonomous and either keep the subjective con- tents of his research to himself or totally ignored them. Often enough, we thus axpe- rience a tragic metamorphosis like the following: the sullen house-tyrant of a local university turns into a colleague who is affably cracking jokes during coffee-break of the congress of the year.

All these things, the modes of behavior, .the talking, the worries that caused these deformations and deprivations are of course not exclusively mafe. They may seem to be so, because men are still the overwhelming majority In !tig!er academic positions. For once, let us assume that under the just described circumstances these men of science feel just as oppressed by every&ay science as *most of the few wo- men. Let us also assume that the latter would come up with the courage, power, and imagination required to not only talk of the necessity to change this practice and its Ilanguage, but to actually act accordingly. Now even if these women wanted to, would they be able to speak up, and would the male academics react at all dif- ferently? I am sceptical: realizing better living conditions, bringing happmess into !routine is first of all a matter of money, also i: the world of science. At the same ,time the questron is whether the same persons who are wiliing to change things pos- sess the physical stability that is needed for the W&: to hold out nonconformism, to make one’s own standards of value and r ecds into one’s guiaing principle in (everyday life. Also, it requires an emotional ef!ort of sr.?ggering proportions to keep one’s identity in the academic work surrour.iings. H:istancing oneself trom one’s own academic: socialization demands so much zou :ageous effort in coming, to teims with one’s past that it seems to have been a suc:ess only occasionally and under exceptional ccnditions. Also in linguistics, tht-re s re only a few who know how tmo use a languat:: that is clear, thoughtful, and c( aci! e at the same time. Those are the few wh’o we. L given the chance to take the;r subjectivity seriously enough to be able to assin-ilate it in their work without ha-4ng to bother us with their irrelevant idiosyncrasies or the bored.om of pure abstract the Mzing.

Tumming up then, hearing a sentnce such as “IYomen’s language means change” is no small tncouragemcnt, since Y aealile tha,r p:ople do talk about cha.nge after all, both in the public S$S” and in science, Yet, reflecting on what this sentence retiy means for the substance of my life and w ark sphere, and asking wself to what ex.tent (if at all) worlle;i are able to rn<ike cjuurges in the ‘language of science, I find that there, too, changas are relegated to a Utopia we can only catch up with in tiresome everyday efforts. ilnd we know that thi!i Utopia io necessary for SurvivaL Our inner and outer conditions of life put up barriers which everybody has to over- come, beginni*rg with her- and himself.

Tr&~~$Pl&fz, Senta. 197Qa. Mlmwr Ieden - E:rauen schweigen: Frauensprache. (Lecture, held a’~ the U&versify of Matburg, fune 15,197F. Unpublished Ms.)

TrBmel-Pliirfz, Senta. 1979b. Frauensqache in unserer Welt der MEinner. Konstanz: Universi- xtitsverhg.

C&&I ~~~~~-~~~j~~ (b. 1944) sfudied Anguisfics, German Liferatwe, Sociology and Philosophy in ~r~k~~rf, Marburg and Berlin (West). 1972 Da*. @il. in Socioiinguistics, I<79 Habilirarim in ~~~~~~~,~~~. Mnb interests: socio.inguisfics, plsycholinguistics (including psychoanalysis).. of prowar working st the Max-Planck-InmWt firr Psychdinguisrfk in Nijmegen, The Nether- Lmds, on a F snjecf abouf the genesis of’discourx abiiities in children.

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